Gladys M. Lunsford Dimmick was born on November 8, 1923, in the community of Cedar Grove in Orange County, North Carolina, to Harvie R. and Biddie R. Lunsford. Gladys Lunsford graduated from Bragtown High School in Durham, North Carolina, in 1939. After high school, she spent several years working at the nearby Liggett-Myers Tobacco Company factory in Durham. In December 1943, Gladys Lunsford enlisted during World War II in the WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service), and attended boot camp at Hunter College in New York.

In February 1944, Lunsford was assigned to work in air traffic control as a control tower operator at the U.S. Naval Air Station in Norfolk, Virginia. Gladys Lunsford married Jim Dimmick in December 1946. She left the WAVES in February 1947.

The Dimmicks moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, where they both attended the University of Florida under the GI Bill following WWII. In 1954, the Dimmick family settled in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. In Chapel Hill, Gladys Dimmick worked as a secretary for several deans of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill's Law School, and later as Director of Placement and Alumni Affairs. Dimmick later worked as an assistant to Judge J. Dickson Phillips of the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. Gladys L. Dimmick died on May 5, 2011, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

This oral history interview was digitized through the support by grant funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the federal Library Services and Technology Act as administered by the State Library of North Carolina, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources (IMLS grant number LS-00-17-0034-17).

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